Untitled - eCommons@Cornell - Cornell University

278 COLLEGE OF CIVIL ENGINEERING.
of easements and servitudes, and the ordinary principles of the laws
of contracts and riparian rights. A course in political economy ex
tending over one year, of three lectures per week, is given for the
purpose of elucidating the economic value of the civil engineer as
director of industrial enterprises, and their role in the development of
the country.
To the fundamental instruction of a general undergraduate course,
many special courses are in full operation for graduates desiring ad
vanced study in the separate branches of their profession. Admission
to these courses is open to civil engineers of this or other institutions
having
undergraduate courses similar to our own. Advanced and
special instruction is offered in the following subjects : bridge engi
neering, railroad engineering, sanitary, municipal, hydraulic and
geodetic engineering. The object of this instruction is to provide the
young graduate with the means of prosecuting advanced investigations
after such experience in professional life as may lead him to decide in
the choice of a specialty. The same courses are open to teachers and
professional men in a more advanced form and with larger liberty in
the use of laboratory equipment. Lectures in the museum and labora
tories are given to these students for the purpose of directing and aid
ing their original researches. All graduate work may alternate with
a limited number of elective studies in other colleges of this Univer
sity ;
but the choice of electives implies suitable preparation for their
prosecution, and must, besides, meet with the approval of the Director
of the College.
The College of Civil Engineering is quartered in a substantial brown
stone structure, two hundred feet long and seventy feet wide, specially
designed for the purposes of the college. In addition to the labora
tories and museums, the building contains the of working library the
college, aggregating about three thousand volumes, reading-rooms,
class rooms, and draughting rooms. The building contains also the
offices of the professors, the offices of the U. S. Weather Bureau for the
State of New York, and the meteorological observatory
of the
college of civil engineering. The astronomical department of this
college is housed in an observatory containing all the instruments
required to find time, latitude, longitude and azimuth. The instru
ments are duplicates, in the main, of similar ones in use by the U. S.
Coast and Geodetic Survey. The great Hydraulic with Laboratory its
equipment, buildings and appurtenances is located at the Fall Creek
gorge, within a short distance from the College buildings.
LABORATORIES.
The Civil Engineering Laboratories within the college
build-